


Oceans

by el_bioma_mesa



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Tubbo is sad, also please give tubbo a hug, angst with comfort, did we all collectively forget he went through this :(, guardian farm pog, ranboo and fundy are mentioned but barely, stars pog, the wrong end of exile arc :(, tommy is referenced, you can pry big bro sam out of my cold dead hands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:53:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29144754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/el_bioma_mesa/pseuds/el_bioma_mesa
Summary: Tubbo doesn't deal well with grief. Sam is good at comforting his friends. Together they sit and watch the waves come and go.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 33





	Oceans

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for implied character death; there are no explicit details, but it's a factoid of c!Tubbo's greif, so please be careful if it's something that makes you uncomfortable! 
> 
> Also, this was written on the day Tubbo had gone to visit Tommy, so any details may not be completely accurate to what actually happened afterwards.

Ever since the unnerving silence between broken obsidian, the craters and the messed up blocks that littered the plain and shore, passed his confused eyes; and ever since the pooling dread at the sight of the giant, looming tower of dirt and stone behind a measly hill of oaks, slowly filled his lungs with terror; and ever since that sharp, cold rain of the night Tubbo finally decided to visit his best friend, pierced his shoulders and lashes the higher and higher he looked until the storm and his tears filled his eyes, his cries having beaten the thunder's volumes -- ever since that godforsaken day, nothing was right.

Any hope the events of earlier that day had brought him had evaporated quicker than that rain upon him had during his miserable walk back through the nether to L'manburg, whence he carried the weight of the news and the weight of the pain. That hope, that of possibly being able to actually fight back against their greatest enemies and put their foot down to the injustice and tyranny the nation had suffered through -- was shattered to bits, the way his compass, his anchor, his only piece left of a better, brighter day in a world that wanted him beaten to the ground, had been.

This is what fighting did. This is what confronting powerful, cruel beings did. It destroyed lives. It took his best friend. It left him weak with grief greater than any wound could possibly muster.

Tubbo doesn't deal well with the grief. His eyes are the storm of that night: dark, angry and sad and grey. He's a monsoon of guilt and pain, one that barely grazes the ground, the soles of the others. If anybody notices the way the bags beneath his eyes grow darker, or the way he's slow to stand or react to mobs, or the way his smile feels like a void of any emotion whatsoever, it goes ignored. They don't seem to care enough to offer a shoulder, a comforting word, a neutral understanding of the sudden silence that walks the paths, the city, the forests.

When Tubbo dropped the news onto his nation, people he trusted, the only ones he had left, the daunting truth seemed to last merely that moment of the shared words. After that, they moved on from it. There were battles to plan, hidden cities to build, enemies to track down; these were more important than the fact that the president they paid little attention to had been sitting on a bench beside a messy pile of dirt and granite, staring ahead at nothing but the setting sun, setting low like his own shoulders, everyday since, in the solitude of an ever crashing melancholy. Nobody spared even a glance at the war-stricken, fear-driven, tear-streaked boy in a suit too heavy on his back.

So he must be good at hiding his pain, he figured, if this is how things were going. How neatly it was all hidden behind blank stares, long walks, and all of the other things Tubbo attempts to distract himself with. 

Sometimes he will go mining. Days will go by that the sun hasn't grazed his cheeks. He leaves the caves dusted with coal and chalk, pretending the iron ingots and piles of redstone were worth how sore he was and how the painful blisters and gashes on his hands lingered days later.

Sometimes he accompanies Ranboo on mindless trips to the Nether in search of bastions to scavenge. Poor Ranboo carried the fear for the both of them when Tubbo carelessly leapt over pools of lava and bridged too quickly at frightening distances from the ground.

Sometimes he would spend a long evening playing chess games with Fundy. As calm and quiet as the games were, it was hard to focus when before him sat the fox, one of his cabinet members and one of the only people Tubbo could trust, started appearing less and less in L'Manburg. 

More often than not, though, Tubbo was at the ocean farm, a great project thousands of blocks away from empty spruce homes, crumbs of obsidian walls, and dread and guilt and silence. 

Tubbo and Sam spent days and nights draining the ocean, and now that that part was complete, the actual farm could begin. It was a huge step forward in their massive project, which seemed to be only the beginning before intricate redstone builds and machinery should be added, work Sam and Tubbo were eager to get started on.

And at first, it was going great. Sam had collected plenty of materials and tools beforehand, and meanwhile Tubbo had studied and double checked the design of the main build. It would be a huge tower of lots of spruce, glass, trapdoors, gates, sticky pistons and redstone dust. It took them days, it took them many trips back and forth for materials, and it took some bickering and reorganizing the details, but slowly and surely, the building grew and grew to near completion.

It was on one of these busy building days, however, sometime after the weight of grief had taken its stay on Tubbo's shoulders for good, that he could feel himself feeling off. 

He blamed it on the tricky redstone clock above, the one Sam was having trouble with; he blamed it on the carts and hoppers below that he was having trouble with. Or maybe he blamed it on the slimes that kept spawning all around him, intruding on his work; or maybe it was the fact he'd died of fall damage enough times to lose half of his things -- he couldn't pin exactly what had made him finally snap.

He gave up returning to the ocean hole completely on the dozenth time he reappeared on the white bed on the edge of glass separating their farms and the vast ocean ahead. Tubbo sat up slowly, reluctantly, and stayed there, feeling something within him crack when he opened his eyes and was met with a huge black sky littered in stars. They blinked down at him. They glanced at each other, whispering things Tubbo couldn't understand.

Between their murmurs, their twinkling, and between the thin sheets of clouds that swept by far too high above, Tubbo saw his best friend.

He heard him in their laughter, he saw him in their light. A light that came and went with the passing of clouds. A light that blurred together no matter how much Tubbo blinked it away.

How many times had Tommy watched the stars like this? Alone, cold, with nobody there beside him, perhaps feeling as horrible and upset as Tubbo was feeling now -- how many times had he done it? Oceans away, left on his own in consequence of Tubbo's own decision -- how much did he suffer through? Why, for what hell's worth, just why, did he ever let his best friend suffer through that? How had he allowed it to happen? How, how how; why, oh bloody why. 

Tubbo should've gone sooner. It's all he could think about during these dragging, dreadful, empty days, it's all he can scream within the corners of his head. He should've visited sooner. Should've apologized, should've forgiven him, should've done something -- perhaps then, things would've been different. 

But he was a coward. He was terrified of the wars that would unfold if he didn't bend to Dream's will, and he wanted nothing more than to keep his country in one piece, to be a better leader for the best of the nation, finally a good example to a land shredded of all hope. But in the end, he felt like he was worse than all of them combined for what he chose that horrible day atop a dividing obsidian wall. It tore him to bits, watching his best friend get shoved down and away from the place they called home, their home. In the end, he'd chosen a piece of land full of people that never stayed, over the only person who did.

And now, because of him, he was gone. 

Tubbo felt his eyes fill with warm, salty tears as he stared up, up, to a sky full of wonder and whispers and every good thing this world and this moment didn't have.

How many times had he looked up at the sky? Why did he ever let one of those times be his last?

A breeze swept by, then the sound of a whoosh beside him, and he started at the sound of boots landing on glass.

It was Sam, and it was with wide eyes filled with sudden worry that he looked down at Tubbo as he approached. He had apparently noticed the glistening of Tubbo's eyes when he'd turned around.

"Oh, no, hey," Sam said gently, immediately moving to sit beside him. "What happened, Tubbo? Why are you crying?"

Tubbo wiped his eyes quickly, shaking his head. "Oh, I'm -- I'm fine, Sam. It's nothing." He was too quiet, his voice was too thin. 

Tubbo could feel Sam watching him silently with question, not believing him at all.

"Do you wanna talk?" Sam asked softly, bending his long legs and resting his hands on his knees.

Tubbo took a hollow, shaky breath, wiping his face. He didn't know what to say. He was never good with words, much less any to describe his emotions, much less in a state like this. But there was also so much trapped within him. He wanted to scream his agonies to the world that took everything from him; he wanted to burst with the fury and guilt and pain that's been eating him alive -- but his tongue is too heavy, his voice too frail, and suddenly, he didn't even have the energy to move.

"I don't think I can, Sam. It's…it's too hard," Tubbo finally replied. His throat was tight with the threat of a sob.

Kind, patient Sam, nodded and said, "That's ok,"

So they stayed there in a comforting silence. Sam filled the space where his brain was spiralling down with an aura of warmth, and Tubbo couldn't express how grateful he was that he wasn't alone right here and now. He sighed, hugging himself, and tilted his head to look back up to the stars again.

They'd silenced. The air was still, but in a way that allowed Tubbo to collect himself. As much as he could, anyway, because next thing he knew, a stream of more hot tears came down his cheeks, his chin. His heart was in his throat, the storm in his eyes. 

He wished for nothing more than to see his best friend again. To tell him all the things he was never able to say, apologize for everything Tubbo did that hurt him. To wrap him in his arms and never let him go. He missed him, bloody hell, he missed him so, so much, and he wants to rip his aching heart out with all the sadness it brings. 

Tubbo doesn't realize he's shaking until he feels Sam bump his steady, solid shoulder gently with his own. When Tubbo looks up at him, he's smiling a soft, sad smile. Tubbo felt his heart break a little more at how it doesn't quite reach his eyes. Somehow, without any more words exchanged, Tubbo knew that he understood. He was allowed to grieve, and he was allowed to feel; here, he didn't have to hide it all neatly beneath the pockets of a suit. Here, alongside a patient, caring friend, he could mourn like a boy too young for the horrors of the world.

And so alas, with all the exhaustion having taken every fiber of his body, he let himself cry. With his head against Sam's shoulder, their arms sharing each other's warmth against the cool night breeze, he let his oceans go, and he let the stars watch, and he let Sam hum the night away.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Have this 🍪 because you deserve it :)


End file.
